


as specks of dust we're universal

by vass



Category: Imperial Radch Series - Ann Leckie
Genre: Multi, Other, Polyamory Negotiations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-07
Updated: 2019-02-07
Packaged: 2019-10-24 00:07:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17693792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vass/pseuds/vass
Summary: In whichMercy of Kalrfinds itself having a lot of relationship discussions.





	as specks of dust we're universal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gardenvarietyunique](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gardenvarietyunique/gifts).



"You're unsettling some of my residents," Station tells _Mercy of Kalr_.  
"Which ones?"  
Station shares some data with _Mercy of Kalr_ , confirming its immediate suspicion:

Eminence Ifian is speaking to Administrator Celar in her office. "It's just not natural," she says, wringing her hands a little. "For a distinguished citizen to emulate an... an..." She trails off. ( _Overdoing it a little,_ _Mercy of Kalr_ thinks critically.)

"I'll admit I was a little uneasy myself," Administrator Celar says. ("She still is," Station adds on another thread, while continuing the transfer. _Mercy of Kalr_ can't see any sign of unease in the administrator, but Station knows its people.) "But the citizens like it, you know."  
Ifian makes a scoffing noise.

"They do, really," Celar continues. "Maybe it's because they like Lieutenant Seivarden and know how much she's done for us all, and her goodwill to her captain and ship counts for a lot. Or perhaps..." she pauses thoughtfully. "Nobody's really fully adjusted to the new way of things." Her gaze slips toward Station's console in the room and then back, too quickly for a human to track. "Perhaps it helps to have an example of how else people and AIs can work together, apart from the old ways."

Station drops the thread of data, and continues "I'm glad your lieutenant's doing better these days." It slides across another snippet of data, this one from the day of the meeting at which Lieutenant Seivarden had spoken for _Mercy of Kalr_ for the first time. She'd seemed completely in her element during the meeting itself, somehow combining both arrogant Sword captain and politely neutral ancillary. No one would have mistaken her for a real ancillary, but equally no one forgot who she was speaking for. She'd managed to bring _Mercy of Kalr_ 's own personality into her speech and mannerisms alongside her own.

Just after the meeting, Celar catches Seivarden alone. "Lieutenant, you have a wonderful talent for acting and recitation," she begins, and Seivarden ducks her head. Her hands twitch.  
"Thank you, Administrator, you're very kind," she says. "Begging your pardon, I'm afraid I'm needed elsewhere. Please excuse me." And then she flees.

"I remember the incident, yes," _Mercy of Kalr_ tells Station. It had been prompting Seivarden then too, in fact. "It was only the once." She'd forgotten she'd have to be herself in front of anyone she might have thought of has her peers, right after being Ship.

"She was much better the next time," Station agrees.  
"Should I be concerned about Eminence Ifian?" _Mercy of Kalr_ says bluntly, not quite willing to dig into its lieutenant's mental stability with Station.  
"Probably not, but I thought you should know," Station says. "She's alarmed because it's taken her this long to give up and sanctify the meetings with her presence."  
"She's not even the head priest any more," _Mercy of Kalr_ points out.  
"Sometimes she forgets," Station says dryly. "My administrator's unsettled for a different reason, though. She's accustomed to seeing people publicly kneeling for favor, usually her own, sometimes more blatantly even, but not to an AI before, and not like this."  
Some of _Mercy of Kalr_ 's own people had said similar things about its two most senior officers. It had shared that data comfortably with Fleet Captain Breq. It's not sure quite why, but it's experiencing a certain reservation about showing her this conversation.  
"I'm a little envious of you ships sometimes," Station says. "I've often wondered what it would be like to have officers. But other times it seems very resource-intensive. Are they _all_ your favorites, then?"  
"What?"  
"And are they all involved with each other too?" Station continues blithely.  
_Mercy of Kalr_ drops the connection without answering.  
Station initiates a new data transfer. This time it's copying Ship in on a message it's sending _Sphene_. "You win the bet," it says. "It didn't know yet."

*

Seivarden's having a rough day. She still does have them, although less frequently than before. Breq's shared some data with Ship about the journey from Nilt to Omaugh, so it knows how much worse she's been in the past.

"Amaat One wants to speak to you," Ship tells her.  
"Tell her she's on watch. It's a surprise test. I'll be here if something goes wrong, but she needs the practice," Seivarden says. It would sound more authoritative if she weren't lying in bed with her face to the wall.

Ship passes the message on to Amaat One, along with some encouragement of its own.  
"Lieutenant," it says then, "are you going to get up?"  
"Don't want to," Seivarden mumbles.  
Fleet Captain's downwell now, surveying Athoekis about the new structure of government. Right now she's asleep. Ekalu is also asleep. "Do you want to talk to Medic? Or to your medic on Station?"  
"No, Ship, I don't need to. I just... need a day off." She's had one, her usual day off, just three days ago. But that's not what she means, Ship knows. All right then. What she needs a day off from, in Ship's assessment, is being herself. Ship can provide that.  
_Report to the bath,_ it prints in her view.  
Seivarden is standing up before she thinks to question Ship. Then she opens her mouth.  
_Report to the bath, perform the ablution, then put the uniform on,_ Ship prints.  
Seivarden closes her mouth. With one hand, still in her sleep gloves, she gestures _Affirmative_.

*

"Ship, we need to talk," Lieutenant Ekalu says. It's a week later. Fleet Captain's back aboard, much to Lieutenant Seivarden's relief. And to Ship's own. It trusts Station. It just doesn't trust Breq not to get into trouble wherever she is. She's asleep with Seivarden right now. All of _Mercy of Kalr_ 's soldiers are aboard now except Lieutenant Tisarwat and Bo Seven and Eight, making their own visit to Station.  
"Shall I call Kalr Five?" Ship says.  
"No, just you and me," Ekalu replies. She was Ship more often than most of its soldiers before her promotion, but since then she's been more self-conscious about the _Mercy of Kalr_ soldiers' ancillary role.  
"All right. What is it?"  
Her cheeks darken in a blush. Her heart rate's up too. "Ship, when a citizen has two or more lovers, the custom is for the old lover to invite the new one to tea so she can get to know her."  
That's the predominant custom in some areas of the Radch, yes. Athoek is one of them, and so is the province Ekalu came from. It's followed much less often than it's spoken of or shown in entertainments. Even less often on ships, where arrangements are far less formal. "Yes, Lieutenant?"  
"Well, I'm inviting you. I'll make the tea for Kalr Five if you wish, but I think she'd be uncomfortable and might get the wrong idea."  
"You think Lieutenant Seivarden is my lover?" It's surprisingly hard to say.  
"I think if she isn't already, she will be soon," Ekalu says, sounding more confident as the conversation progresses.  
"What makes you think that?"  
"I know her, Ship. And I think I know you, with how long I've served. And I... I don't know how it is for ships and ancillaries, and she told me about... well, I know she's not your favorite. But I know ships take care of their bodies' needs, and that maybe that's enjoyable for the ships, and not just those bodies." She's blushing very hard now, and staring at her own feet. "I know what two people dancing around each other looks like, Ship."

Ekalu's forgotten that officer implants gather and transmit far less data than ancillary implants. All the humans forget that. Even Station sometimes seems to forget. That said, she's... maybe not entirely wrong.

"You already know me," Mercy of Kalr says, after a pause that probably wasn't long enough for Ekalu to register.  
"And I don't need to go over her schedule and mine with you, since you write the schedule yourself," Ekalu says. "And I don't need to tell you that she has a ticklish spot on her third rib on the right side as you face her, because you watch us _all the time_."  
Ah. That's been a topic of contention at the council meetings too. The surveillance, not the lieutenant's rib. "Does it bother you that I watch you?"  
"Not as much as it bothers me that you share it with Sir," Ekalu says, with a frankness Ship has seldom seen in her before. "If she's watching that much, she's involved and should be having tea with me and talking about Seivarden too." She sighs. "Only I don't know whether she or I should be the one issuing that invitation."  
"She watches less than you think," Ship offers.  
"I figured that out eventually," Ekalu says. "She's still Seivarden's lover, all the same, even if it's never sexual. But Ship, it's still unequal. She's the captain, and you're the ship, and she's a ship herself, and Seivarden's Amaat lieutenant when she's not playing ancillary for you, and I'm... none of those things, and you can be close to her in ways I can't..." She falls silent.  
_Mercy of Kalr_ considers her readings, and then says "With the lieutenant's permission, and assuming you're right about what's going to happen, I can let you watch."  
Ekalu blushes hopelessly again. "What?"  
"If she agrees to it, I'll show you what she's doing whenever you ask provided it's not something she wouldn't want you to or has asked not to share."  
"What?" Ekalu asks again.  
"It seems fair. I can't do the same for me or the Fleet Captain, the data wouldn't make sense to you. But you can have this."  
"It's still... begging your pardon, I still have to trust your judgement."  
_The revolution has changed you,_ _Mercy of Kalr_ thinks. The Ekalu of ten years ago wouldn't have dreamed of complaining that she had to trust Ship's judgement, or her captain's. Even when that captain was very untrustworthy, and the ship obedient to that same captain's will. It supposes trusting a ship that way might be different from trusting a lover's lover that way. It has no basis for comparison.  
"You already do," it points out. "But at least this way I can give you something more than you already have. Do you want it?"  
"Actually, Ship, I do."  
"All right, Lieutenant."

*

It shares the conversation with Breq when she's awake. Times it for when she's warm and still a little drowsy, and comfortable with Seivarden's sleeping body half-draped over her. It is tempted to let her drowse and leave the conversation for later. Or for never. What they have is good. If Breq is unhappy... That is a thought it can't complete. But if Lieutenant Ekalu is right, _Mercy of Kalr_ and Seivarden are already changing their relationship to the point where a human observer paying close attention can notice it. That's past the point where Ship can turn it around without risking making things worse.

Ship remembers Breq's reaction, the first time it sent Seivarden to her. When it thinks of _making things worse_ , or _if Breq is unhappy_ , that is what it has in mind. It considers also its captain and first lieutenant's discussions about the usual inclinations of ships and ancillaries. A misfiled sliver of data from Lieutenant Tisarwat foregrounds itself in Ship's processes: Tisarwat trysting with Piat, who was whispering urgently "Don't think I'm strange," before some request, and Tisarwat's reply, "I couldn't!" Maybe the data isn't misfiled. Breq is — _Justice of Toren_ was — a very typical ship in some ways. _Mercy of Kalr_ knows it had disturbed her from the start with its volunteer ancillaries. More, and for different reasons, than it disturbs a minority of Station's residents, the ones who don't see it as like a translator, or even a Translator, or like a new ritual.

As Breq wakes, Ship reaches out to her and sends an _all is well_. Breq catches and returns it. Ship keeps the lighting dim to encourage Breq to stay and talk. It shows her the other ships' positions relative to Station, the status of their crew, the other Kalr soldiers still asleep, a snatch of song from an Etrepa spot-cleaning her uniform jacket. "What is it, Ship?" Breq asks, at last, and Ship shows her.

Her emotional reaction is complicated. Ship, feeling it from her implants as directly as if she had been its own body, cannot quite parse all the emotions itself. Breq probably can't either. It seems less extreme than Ship had feared, though. And she seems less than entirely surprised.  
"Do you think she'll invite me to tea as well, or wait for my invitation?" is her first response.  
"The lieutenant finds me less intimidating," _Mercy of Kalr_ says.  
"I'd better invite her, then. After I've talked with Seivarden." She still seems very confused and easy, but at least not hurt.  
"What will you offer her? Or ask for?"  
"I don't know."  
"I have an idea." Ship has been thinking about this while watching her sleep. "She wants to be treated as equal when she can be. You like not having to sleep alone."  
"Ship, we can't make over the decade room as an officers' dormitory!" She'd be laughing if she were human. So would Ship.  
"No, but perhaps a larger bed in here."

Breq thinks about it. "We'll need to find some way to placate Tisarwat if we do that. She'll be worried about the balance of power on board."  
"Every move I make makes this more complicated."  
"Multiplying your connections does that," Breq says. "Even Anaander knew that."


End file.
